Sci-Fi, Fantasy & Horror Reviews

Book Review: Eclipse Four

By Sandy Amazeen Jul 30, 2011, 1:33 GMT

World Fantasy Award-winner Jonathan Strahan delivers the fourth volume of this series, once again demonstrating his keen editorial eye. The multi-award winning Eclipse series (Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, Locus, Aurealis) is the only on-going anthology for original non-themed science fiction and fantasy, and its contents have been regularly recognized as some of the most compelling stories of the year, both on awards ballots and on best-of-the-year lists. Eclipse 4 delivers ...more

This fourth anthology loosely based on some facet of time or space features several enjoyable surprises as illustrated by the first story about an interesting bet in “Slow as a Bullet” by Andy Duncan. Damien Broderick’s “The Beancounter’s Cat” is a fascinating tale including a talking feline packing plenty of attitude about choices with the power to reshape existence as certain civilizations know it. Shoppers’ ghosts reside at a mall, going on and off the clock, repeating their deaths, feeding upon those who begin to remember senses like smell in “Old Habits” by Nalo Hopkinson. These are just a sampling of the fourteen very different short stories by a variety of both award winning and lesser-known authors.

Although there is no strong uniting theme to this collection each story is inventive, thought provoking and a few are simply good fun. Look no further for the perfect vacation read.